Report: it was a Spurs director that refused to shake hands with Newcastle executives

Newcastle United's new financial backing was always destined to ruffle a few feathers.

Ever since the Saudi-led takeover of the club in October 2021, the word has been that the established order of the "top six" wasn't happy that a challenger was set to emerge from the chasing pack.

Indeed, Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur have consistently been named by journalists as the two clubs with the most to say about the Magpies' new ownership.

It comes as no surprise, then, that the "opposition director" mentioned in an excellent article by Oliver Kay in The Athletic yesterday appears to have been a bigwig fromSpurs.

Here's the excerpt from Kay's article that mentions the frosty exchange:

It came on a matchday when, walking into the directors’ lounge at a rival club, the Newcastle delegation encountered their frostiest reception yet. Hands were outstretched by the visitors from Tyneside, there to be shaken, but were conspicuously ignored by one opposition director, seemingly eager to make his hostility clear.

The episode was so awkward that the Newcastle executive on the receiving end relayed it on the insistence that identities were withheld. But it will not be forgotten in a hurry.

As much as it felt like a hostile act, it also felt, in a funny sort of way, like acceptance — acceptance, that is, that English football’s latest established order is under threat.

At last night's True Faith live event at The Stand comedy club in Newcastle, the assembled cast of journalists was apparently asked about the event outlined above.

George Caulkin (The Athletic), Mark Douglas (The i), Keith Downie (Sky Sports), and Craig Hope (The Daily Mail) were the journalists in question and while none of them explicitly stated that the director was from Spurs, they certainly intimated as much.

How sweet it was, then, that we not only beat them 2-1 at their place but absolutely demolished them 6-1 at St. James' Park as well. And now they're losing Harry Kane. What a shame.